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Some Interesting Stuff that Relates to Other Interesting Stuff I’ve Been Thinking About

Playing around on teh Internets this afternoon led me to a couple of things that seem relevant to other things I’ve been considering.

Firstly: how to use social media well. Here‘s an example of someone who’s doing it, I think. It’s a videobook about YouTube…on YouTube. It’s actually an interesting concept that shows the power of social media to spread good information. (And it’s reflexive, which is always cool.) I found this via the UGL Facebook page, and they’ve asked whether this is the future of the book. My answer: I hope not. I love the ways this technology is being used. But I don’t think it can replace the book. Here’s my criteria:
1. Books are easily browsable. I can flip through pages of a book, pick a place at random, and look for what I’m looking for, or see if I’ll like it, or whatever. This videobook adds features I never knew were possible to make this closer to a reality, but it’s still limited. Browsability is among the most important aspects of books and libraries to me, and I think to knowledge and information in general.
2. Books offer depth of knowledge. Although this videobook makes a complete argument from beginning to finish, compressing all of the content of a monograph into video would take far too long. Trying to squeeze one content area into another medium can compress a full thesis into sound bytes. There’s value in gaining deep understanding that, so far, comes strongly from text. And usually page-based text.

Secondly: identities are incredibly complex. This video from one of my favorite sets of vloggers also talks about using information technology well (They’ve launched Your Pants! I’ve spent some time exploring in Your Pants. You might want to find Your Pants. The stuff in Your Pants is pretty exciting.) But it also, at the end, discusses how identities, both those that we choose and those that choose us, resist simplicity. Those of us who claim certain identities, whether we’d like to claim them or not, have to live them as well. And that’s what gives them their meaning. When I claim an identity as a male, or white, or as a Nerdfighter, I don’t just fit into that box. I work with others who claim that identity, and those who claim opposing identities, to create what that means. Sometimes it means things I don’t want it to mean–that I’ve got privilege in society that excludes others, for example. But it always resists a simple definition. And that’s what makes life so exciting.